Okay, ESPN. Just Stop. I Surrender...

by Matt Brannen

I can't escape it, so I guess I have no choice but to give in. ESPN's overwhelming promotion of LeBron James in this year's NBA playoffs has beaten me down to the point of submission. The final blow was ESPN's decision over Memorial Day Weekend to replay and then discuss, ad naseum, James' final second 3 point shot to win game 2 against Orlando in the Eastern Conference Finals. ESPN went so far on all of its TV outlets, including ESPN News (which is supposed to be reserved for continously updated sports news and scores), to go into full LeBronathon mode at every turn with no consideration for reporting the live score of other playoff sports (namely, the NHL, which is also in its conference finals too) to get in its LeBron features. While the shot won the game, someone unfamiliar with the series would think that it won the NBA Championship with the significance that ESPN gave it. That, in itself, is the problem.

There is no question that James is currently one of the top two or three NBA players, if not the best player in the league (depending on someone's opinion on the matter). However, the hyperbole under which ESPN showers James with on a regular basis (especially recently) has to make it difficult for any basketball fan under the age of 25 to recognize that there have been other people that have actually accomplished things with a basketball prior to "King James" arrival to "the Association." Almost immediately, the comparison was foisted upon us by "The Worldwide Leader" that James' shot was as important, if not more so, than Michael Jordan's series clinching, last second shot to beat Cleveland back in the late 1980s. ESPN then proceeded to roll out an "expert" panel of its analysts to talk at length about the importance of the shot, both for the series and in NBA history. Such basketball luminaries on the panel like Magic Johnson gushed over the shot and what James had accomplished in his young career. This "report," as it was sometimes described, was run every half hour for nearly an entire afternoon on ESPN News while the channel refused to do audio score updates of other playoff action (Aside: They did have time to do regular baseball updates). This, mind you, was only a few days after ESPN unveiled a new documentary special on LeBron James and Kobe Bryant. It seemed like ESPN was 30 seconds away from unveiling James' bust in the NBA Hall of Fame. Then again, they've already put James on the list for the "Mount Rushmore of (Ohio) Sports," so maybe that is understating things.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/sportscenter/news/story?id=3835108

Someone needs to explain to ESPN that James' shot made the series 1-1 and Orlando could have won both games 1 and 2. Furthermore, the shot lost even more of its significance when Orlando soundly defeated James and his Cavaliers in game 3 to take a 2-1 lead. I'm sure ESPN's army of researchers are pouring over stats in an effort to present the defense that game 3 wasn't James' fault and figuring how to present a potential series loss as not being their NBA icon's responsibility. It's either time that this ends or time for me to stop expecting ESPN to actually report on sports.

ESPN announced earlier in the year that their ombudsman (Le Anne Schreiber), a person whose job it is to study what is reported and reports to the network about their practices, would be replaced because her tenure with the network expired. What was her last message to the network, you ask? "Stop with the overcoverage" (as you can see by clicking on the below weblink). In fact, her last column was entitled "Excess the root of fan frustration" (with ESPN). After this past weekend, it seems like Le Anne Schreiber had as much voice at ESPN as Dick Vitale the day after the NCAA men's basketball tournament ended. None at all.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=schreiber_leanne&id=3983722

I have mentioned in previous columns that ESPN was headed in a straight line to become the MTV of sports. Given to the degree that the network continues to shamelessly promote LeBron James, it makes me wonder if he is becoming the Britney Spears of sports. Need some kind of connection to make that work? Justin Timberlake was the narrator for the Kobe-LeBron ESPN documentary. Enough said. Enough taken. Message to ESPN: I quit. You've won.